Structured metal parts made of titanium or titanium alloys are conventionally made by casting, forging or machining from a billet. These techniques have a disadvantage of high material use of the expensive titanium metal and large lead times in the fabrication.
Fully dense physical objects may be made by a manufacturing technology known as rapid prototyping, rapid manufacturing, layered manufacturing or additive fabrication. This technique employs computer aided design software (CAD) to first construct a virtual model of the object which is to be made, and then transform the virtual model into thin parallel slices or layers, usually horizontally oriented. The physical object may then be made by laying down successive layers of raw material in the form of liquid paste, powder or sheet material resembling the shape of the virtual layers until the entire object is formed. The layers are fused together to form a solid dense object. In case of depositing solid materials which are fused or welded together, the technique is also termed as solid freeform fabrication.
Solid freeform fabrication is a flexible technique allowing creation of objects of almost any shape at relatively fast production rates, typically varying from some hours to several days for each object. The technique is thus suited for formation of prototypes and small production series, but less suited for large volume production.